


Cave Paintings

by Enmuse (Scifiroots)



Category: The Mentalist
Genre: Angst, Comment Fic, Community: comment_fic, Established Relationship, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-01
Updated: 2010-09-01
Packaged: 2017-10-11 09:38:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/110976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scifiroots/pseuds/Enmuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wake up, love, bring the candles raise up the torch, pour water in the ink of night, wash this darkness from my thoughts, cos it comes out of the walls, it comes out of the walls. ("Out of The Walls" Tom McRae)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cave Paintings

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ruuger](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruuger/gifts).



> _Prompt (comment_fic)_: From Ruuger - The Mentalist, Jane/Cho, "[Out of the Walls](http://tommcrae.com/Alphabet/Fred.html#Out)" Tom McRae ([on Youtube](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9va08ZucCGc))  
> _Notes_: The muse wasn't being very cooperative. :( And then there was just nothing happy to run with in terms of this haunting song so... Angst, waahhh

It hasn't always been there but now the stain is set, a marker of remembrance. He doesn't _need_ the reminder, but it does give him something to stare at when he needs an anchor between past and present. That's what it comes down to – a memorial for a past life, something dead and constantly haunting.

Its presence on the wall of his bedroom grants him a sense of calm, something he does not realize until he begins spending more and more nights in a different bedroom. He often wakes in the arms of his lover, heart pounding in reaction to nightmares. He stares at the bare, shadowed walls of Cho's room, searching, searching— No macabre smiling face, no crimson smears, no blood on his hands... not yet.

It takes no stretch of the imagination to picture the scene. He even recalls the little details - the thick, sticky layer of stagnant blood; cooled, stiff bodies; the perfected staging of the murders. He knows that he will find the rest of the apartment untouched and then come face-to-face with the letter posted on the bedroom door. He knows how it will feel to close his trembling hand around the doorknob and stare into the room. He remembers how his mind struggled to accept that the blood on the wall belonged to people he loved. He knows he will not be able to live through it again.

The memories bleed into nightmares, bleed into waking dreams, become unshakable fears. He has no idea how to contain the fear because he knows it is based on experience and fact. He knows the imagined scenario may very well become reality.

One night, when the nightmare has become too vivid, Cho calls and shakes him back to reality. The bedside lamp is turned on, brightening the walls and causing the shadows to slink back into their dark corners. The bare paint that greets him does not grant him much assurance, but he realizes that it isn't likely he'll ever feel settled until the source of the threat is gone.

He doesn't explain when his lover asks; it's probable that Cho has formed a solid guess already. He feels pathetically grateful when Cho decides to leave on the lamp. He is more grateful for the strong arms that embrace him throughout the rest of the night.

\---


End file.
